Every week there’s a bunch of music-related stories, links, videos and other internet goodies that are a little on the trashy side, but for whatever reason get everyone in the office talking.

This is what the Tone Deaf Trash Can is all about: it’s our avenue for sharing the funniest, weirdest and downright tackiest music stories of the week to help you keep up to date with the best (and worst) things happening in pop culture. Don’t feel guilty – you’re allowed to enjoy it.

So It Turns Out One Of The t.A.T.u Singers Is A Homophobic f.U.C.k.w.I.T

Remember how at the end of every Scooby Doo episode the villain turned out to be the person they trusted all along hiding beneath a shitty mask? That’s pretty much what happened to t.A.T.u’s Yulia Volkova this week, who, after fooling the world once by pretending to be gay, fooled us twice by revealing herself to be a good old fashioned homophobe in rained-upon schoolgirl clothing.

Having already exploited the LBGTQ community by faking a lesbian relationship to achieve short-lived mid-2000’s fame, the Short-Haired One has now compared gay people to murderers in an interview on Russian television.

As Gay Star News report, her bigoted spiel began with her saying she wouldn’t accept a gay son.

“Yes, I would condemn him, because I believe that a real man must be a real man. God created man for procreation, it is the nature. The man for me is the support, the strength of … I won’t accept a gay son.” But the 29-year-old walking contradiction didn’t stop there.

“Two girls together — not the same thing as the two men together. It seems to me that lesbians look aesthetically much nicer than two men holding their hands or kissing,” she continued.

“Just want my son to be a real man, not a fag… I have many gay friends. I believe that being gay is all still better than murderers, thieves or drug addicts. If you choose out of all this, being gay a little better than the rest.”

I mean what can you say about that, really? Congrats, Volkova, for forever tainting ‘All The Things She Said’ with all the things you just said.

Gross. The angry people judging them with the umbrellas on the other side of the fence were right all along.

Miley Cyrus Is A Dickhead

That’s an objective headline I’ve been wanting to type for a long, long time, and it felt even better than I’d imagined.

Miley Cyrus is in the Mexican leg of her Bangerz tour, and things have gotten pretty weird. The 21-year-old has been scraping at the bottom of the barrel for so long that it was only inevitable it would come to this: the only thing left in Miley’s barrel of cheap tricks is a cold, flaccid penis.

Alas, this is the station Miley’s train wreck has arrived at: on Sunday she performed onstage in Guadalajara with a plastic dick swinging from her nose, taking the literal form of what most sensible people have been thinking of her since the 2013 VMAs.

Like my jar of Vegemite this morning, try as she might, there is nothing for Miley to scrape onto her butter knife. This, my friends, is rock bottom.

I’d say #pray4Miley, but it’s probably too late for that.

Yeezy Taught Me: Kanye West Is Now A Teacher

As the Trash Can reported back in June, Kanye West has found some kind of loophole in the criminal system and is completing his 250 hours of post-paparazzi brawl community service by teaching fashion/the Bible of Yeezus at colleges across the States.

The first semester at the School of Yeezy kicked off last Friday at the L.A. Trade Technical College, and as anyone would’ve guessed from his infamous mid-show rants, Kanye is absolutely loving the opportunity to talk about himself to a room of people obligated to stay still and listen to him.

Complex interviewed one of Kanye’s #Blessed students, 19-year-old Andre Pitts, who spoke about what it was like to soak up West’s wisdom.

According to Pitts “none of the students knew that he was going to show up”, so when the rapper walked through the doors his “heart dropped, I didn’t believe what I was seeing”.

But what exactly did Kanye talk about in his inaugural lecture? “He didn’t teach us specifically anything. He spoke about, you know, life in general and about his inspirations and whatnot.”

After speaking simultaneously about nothing and everything for over two hours, Kanye then held a no-cameras-allowed Q&A.

“Someone… did actually ask about the Illuminati, and I don’t want to say too much because he did tell the truth this time but I don’t have it on film so I cant really back that stuff up, but he did talk about that topic,” said Pitt, who probably got administered with an electric shock for even bringing up the I-word to begin with.

Perhaps the best bit of Kanye’s lecture, though, was when he was asked if he listens to other artists’ music:

“He said he likes to listen to his own music since he thinks he’s the best artist, still.”

But apparently Pitts wasn’t paying much attention to the lesson, because when Complex asked him if he’s excited to say that Yeezy literally taught him, he responded: “‘Yeezy taught me?’ What do you mean?”

That’s an automatic F. Smdh.

J-Lo And Iggy Azalea Dropped ‘Booty’ And Our Anaconda Don’t

Arriving in the wake of Nicki Minaj’s internet-breaking ‘Anaconda’, J-Lo and Iggy Azalea’s ‘Booty’ was always going to draw comparisons for its shared focus on Butts. The new song successfully got people talking this week, but not necessarily for the right reasons.

Watching ‘Booty’ is like watching two strangers who were covered in baby oil, thrown into a tiny room together and forced to shake their butts up against each other for hours on end in the name of $$$. Because that’s exactly what it is.

The video ends and you feel like Natalie Imbruglia circa 1997: cold, shamed, and lying naked on the floor.

There’s been a lot of talk about why ‘Booty’ failed where ‘Anaconda’ succeeded, and it’s best described by The Music.com.au’s Stephanie Lieu in her op-ed, Why Does J.Lo & Iggy’s Booty-Shaking Feel So Wrong?

In it she notes how ‘Booty’ objectifies J-Lo and Iggy with a barrage of shots showing their arses with their faces cut out. It feels exploitative.

By contrast, ‘Anaconda’ is empowering because it’s a fearless celebration of Minaj straight-up taking charge and owning her sexuality; as Lieu points out, the tongue-in-cheek scene where she cuts up a banana and throws it away has been lost on most, but it’s a powerful image that tells us Minaj is doing it for herself, and not for the male gaze.

No matter how far you read into this – we could go on about this forever – one thing is certain: ‘Booty’ is the most awkward video to hit the internet since a Scottish girl tried to drive her mum’s car.

Lorde Makes A Fan’s Day/Probably Life

There’s been a lot of shitty trash this week. Homophobes, dickheads, the disappointment that you weren’t there for Kanye’s lecture, and then the shuddering ‘Booty’ – we need to end it on a positive note because pop culture has really let us down this week. Where’s Bindi when you need her.

So to try and restore your faith in humanity, here’s a video Lorde tweeted of a 12-year-old girl (with some very impressive Ella locks going on) getting surprised with tickets to her show, and whose happiness will have undoubtedly tripled when she finds out her idol tweeted about her.

This should hit you in the feels.

I think we needed that.

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